Central school teachers' eligibility test on June 26

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) is going to organise a Central Teacher Eligibility Test- 2011 (CTET) for recruitment of teachers in various types of schools at primary and middle level on June 26, Human Resource Development Ministry has said.

In a reply furnished under the Right to Information (RTI) Act, the Ministry said the task of conducting the tests has been entrusted to the CBSE.

It also disclosed that the candidates appearing in the test can choose two out of 19 languages mentioned in list on the CBSE website.

To a query if the list of language did not include Sanskrit, the director (Academic), CBSE, said that a decision has been taken that candidates appearing for CTET can opt for Sanskrit as one of the options in the languages.

Interestingly, a number of questions made under the transparency law by noted RTI activist Subhash Chandra Agrawal to the CBSE like, what was the policy with regard to promotion and propagation of Sanskrit language, has met with the response that the applicant can get further information from the CBSE website.

In an appeal filed before the CBSE’s chief public information officer, Agrawal sought documented reply on all of his queries. “An RTI petitioner is not supposed to have necessarily a facility of internet, and as such all RTI responses should be provided in a hard copy if not specified otherwise. It is not proper for CPIO instead of providing a straight single-word reply, suggested to visit CBSE website,” he contended.

According to the CBSE, the Central Teacher Eligibility Test (CTET)—2011—is scheduled to be held on June 26 at 1,178 Centres in 86 cities across the country, including two centres, abroad.

The examinations will help in creating a database of eligible teachers for government schools.